In my view, this period surprisingly correlates with the first leg of the Fed's balance-sheet expansion [1], from ~$800B to ~$2.2T in 2008.

As a reminder, this was the era of the early iPhones and the first MacBook Air [2] — tech was mature enough, but not yet overcrowded with VCs.

[1] https://www.federalreserve.gov/monetarypolicy/bst_recenttren...

[2] https://web.archive.org/web/20080223071127/http://www.apple....

The best time to be anywhere is when the value of something is obvious but rich people don't yet understand it so they can't micromanage it towards pure productivity and ROI. Money flows in with very little oversight.